INSIGHTS FROM ASIA
Kyoto Journal is an award-winning,
quarterly magazine founded in Kyoto, Japan,
presenting cultural and historical insights from
all of Asia since 1987.
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Gay Jakarta: Defining the Emerging Community
Watch any television channel in Indonesia for more than half an hour and it’s obvious that waria (male-to-female transvestites) are tolerated throughout the country…
Sex in the City and Memoirs of a Geisha: The Way of Tea(se)
Memoirs of a Geisha could have explored in good story-telling fashion the intimacy and fullness’s of one geisha’s life from the inside out. But no! The filmmakers fashioned yet another Orientalist representation of traditional Asian femininity crafted in the frozen imagination of a Western man…
The Open Homeless
Over the past eight years, Ryuta and Chieko Kobayashi have resided in shelters made of cardboard and wood, crafted with their own hands, under the Kojinguchi Bridge on the Kamo River…
Host Clubs: Lessons in Language, Culture, and Power
Hosts are sort of heterosexual male sex workers, but they do not sell ‘sex,’ though it can happen outside of the club. It is more of a companionship…
India’s Bandit Queen: An Interview with Phoolan Devi
Astonishing viewers at the Cannes Film Festival, the 1994 film “Bandit Queen” thrust PHOOLAN DEVI into the international limelight. But Devi criticized the film for being overly graphic and for leaving out major events…
A Vital Occupation
At 1:30 I stop a random stranger on the street, and ask how to get to Akihabara. It may surprise you, but this is one of my special duties. I’m supposed to do one of these every three hours….
Where is the Wild?
Henry was wild about wildness, just couldn’t stop talking about it one way or another, and who can blame him, he saw it disappearing.
The Pillow Book: Translating a Classic
Most people in Japan can reach back to their school days to unhesitatingly recite the famous opening lines of the thousand-year-old classic known in English as The Pillow Book. The sounds roll off the tongue like poetry…
Parabolic Paintings at Kiyomizudera
ART
BY BRIAN WILLIAMS
A World Heritage site, Kiyomizu is the most visited destination in Japan… It was at this matchless and uniquely sited treasure that, on May 14th, 2011, I was given the literally unprecedented privilege of exhibiting my art — debuting my new genre of painting which I call “parabolic painting,” to a one-evening-only gathering of well over two thousand people…
Behind the Brocade Curtain
In the early 1990s I unwittingly moved into a Gion Festival neighborhood…One day I literally stumbled upon the festival’s gigantic floats, some as high as downtown buildings, and marveled at their exquisite adornments of exotic textiles and carvings. I didn’t know what I was looking at, but it blew my mind.
on the blog
Bringing the delights of hojicha tea to the West
Torontoites and hojicha lovers Danielle Geva and Francois Mathieu wanted to make freshest, most authentic roasted Japanese green tea available outside Japan.
Take a Gourmet Journey through Japan with Kokoro Care Packages
We filmed our unboxing of the monthly themed box of quality Japanese ingredients and treats from Kokoro Care Packages. Find out more and subscribe to receive next month's package straight from Japan!
